Does anyone have any experience using serial numbers and not allowing the use of the number 9?
I am not seeing an option to not include a certain character in the serial mask.
I have made many different Serial Numbering systems for Epicor. Out of the box is somewhat limited.
If I recall the ~ is used to indicate a character that should be stripped. Your mask if I remember needs ~9 at end
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| Mask | Description |
|---|---|
| & | This represents any alphanumeric character (for example, 5, A, a). |
| @ | This represents alpha characters (for example, [a to z] or [A to Z]). |
| # | This represents a numeric character (for example, [0 to 9]). |
| ^ | This represents a mandatory variable that can be any alphanumeric character. For example, if you enter 2^ in a mask, when you create a serial number, the ^ must be replaced by a character (not allowed for generation masks). |
| ! | This represents an optional variable that can be any alphanumeric character. You can only add this character as the last character in the mask (not allowed for generation masks). |
| ~ | This represents the characters stripped off when the internal serial number is created. This character can only be at the front or back of the mask (not allowed for generation masks). |
Mask Example 1
*~~~~#####@@*
If the supplier’s serial number is MOTO12345AD and you enter the above example, the serial number created within the application is 12345AD.
Mask Example 2
@@@######P!!
With the mask above, the serial number entered must have a format with three alpha characters, six numeric characters, P for the 10th character, and the 11th and 12th can be any character (they are optional). Therefore, valid serial numbers using this mask could be ABC123456PQ1 or ABC123456P .
Mask Example 3
&&&&########
Using the above mask, if the part number is DSS4000-1 and the date is 7th September 2007, the serial number that is generated would be:
DSS4000-AAAA0000000109072007
Then you add it to the Validation Mask
Serial Mask Type
Displays the generation type for the serial mask. Select one of the following:
- Generation - Serial mask is being used for generation only and cannot be used as a mask for the validation of serial numbers.
- Validaton - Serial mask is being used for validation only and cannot be used as a mask for the generation of serial numbers.
We were hoping for Epicor to auto generate serial numbers. Looks like the ~ is apart of the validation, not generation.
You could always find the Generate Method Directive and handle it in there.
We did something similar for Automotive to make sure the Serial is a VIN by decoding it and so on.
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I have customized the Select Serial Number screen to generate (pull) from a UD table or from a Paste/Insert. I’ve also made complex generation schemes. I found the speed to be faster than Epicor’s generation for large quantities (1000+ SNs). However, it starts to get slow again at 10,000 SNs.
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So the “number” part of of the generated S/N’s would be a sequence like:
1005, 1006, 1007, 1008, 100A, 100B, ..., 100F, 1010, 1011, ..., 1018, 101A, 101B, ...
and
18F5, 18F6, 18F7, 18F8, 18FA, 18FB, ..., 18FF, 1A00, 1A01, ..., 1A08, 1A0A, 1A0B, ...
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@knash - I played around with some BPM’s to auto generate numbers like you want, and determined it was going to be a real hack to do it.
I was looking at how many new S’N’s needed to be created, then determining how many of the next N S/N’s would have a 9 in them. Then create that many more, voiding the ones that had a 9 in them.
But before even getting rid of the 9's, It would have to get rid of the G thru Z chars as well.
Must it be autogenerated? Validating it is obviously much easier.
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Big hint: don’t use BPMs. Use the Customization. There are steps you can bypass too that speed the process up dramatically. I’ve done this before with much more complex numbering requirements.
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We are creating the SN outside of Epicor and then importing/creating them using DMT.
This is a onetime event, so this route gets us to where we need to be in the timeline given.